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the industry movement to get Web products into the marketplace and into people's real lives. I did talk to several companies and visited a few labs to evaluate this possibility, but there didn't seem to be a good match.

Starting a consortium, therefore, represented the best way for me to see the full span of the Web community as it spread into more and more areas. My decision not to turn the Web into my own commercial venture was not any great act of altruism or disdain for money, of which I would later be accused.

While the press was making a big deal about Mosaic Communications, the first World Wide Web conference was now fast approaching. Robert turned his full attention to pulling off an auspicious event.

The conference began at CERN on May 25, and would last three days. It was a tremendous gathering. The auditorium held perhaps three hundred people. We limited registration to three hundred, but ended up with three hundred fifty after admitting members of the press, and others who just appeared—testimony to how the Web had grown.

The student volunteers, whom Robert had rounded up to help run the conference, were manning the registration area. Robert and I, of course, were running around trying to get the last-minute things together. But when I went to go into the conference area, I was very effectively bounced by the students, because the conference wasn't open yet. It took me a long time to get across to them the fact that I was actually involved with the organization that was holding the conference.

As he had promised, Robert had set everything up, and except for the last-minute rushing, I didn't have to do anything but attend and speak. The environment in the meeting rooms was exciting yet close. There were people from all walks of life brought together by their enthusiasm for the Web. Talks given in the small auditorium were packed. Because it was the first such

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